Only 1 stereo compressor: for ducking bass and deep pads, ok to team up percussion?

[fooddude]

Let's say I only have 1 stereo compressor, hooked up from 2 of my sub-bus group out channels from my mackie mixer. I mainly use it for compressing and ducking the bass and sometimes deep/bass'ier pads to the kick drum, on 4/4 type music (house, sometimes disco/funk/soul edits, hip hop type beats, ets). but, since I only have 1 compressor, and I still want to "glue" percussion too..then would this be advisable to patch/group the drums/percussions into the same compressor, which is ducking the bass/pads? Ie: basically using the compressor for ducking bass/pads into my only compressor, and also sending all percussions into the compressor for glueing the drums/percussions.

Asking, because I was thinking in terms of correct percussion/drum "feel"/velocity (some might say swing/shuffle; but I am not talking about timing nor shift nor transposing). Would this be odd? I am not trained as a drummer, but I remember some contexts in basic drumming where the first beat, "1", is always the more predominant beat than 2, 3 and 4. ie: 1 (strong), 2 (a little weaker than 1), 3 (strong again, but not as strong as 1), 4 (a little weaker than 3); also down-beats are supposed to be louder. And, if this is true, then, wouldn't sending percussion into a "ducked" compressor ducking at 4/4 actually weaken the predominant down-beats which is undesirable? Or no? Like everytime the kick hits, of course it'll duck my desired bass/pads; but it too will duck all the percussions on those main downbeats, no? Or, maybe it'll give a different effect, I know for certain it will give it a "breathing" effect; just dont know if its a good choice.
Did that even make sense? lol

basically, in short, my question is: if using my compressor to duck the bass/pads to the kick, is it advisable to use the same compressor for a slight glue to the percussions too?

[sftd]

I suppose it really depends on what you're doing and how it sounds in use.

But generally speaking there is really no way I'd ever even remotely consider doing it personaly.

However, the neat part is if you did it you would be approaching the legendary realm of "sidechain everything, even the kick, to the kick". That is a plus!

Sent from my PC36100 using Gearslutz.com

[bluegreengold]

Gluing percussion tracks together and ducking are very different uses for a compressor, and require different settings. For the purposes you describe I would not send both groups to the same compressor set up for stereo operation. It might be interesting as an effect.

What compressor are you using? Can you split it into two channel mode? Does it have trigger inputs for both channels? Does your mixer have phase invert switches on each channel? Does your mixer have a buss or unused channels?

If the answer to all of the above is yes, then you can set up mid side channels for your percussion mix and your pads on the buss, and then send the mid channel of each to the compressor set for dual mono.

You don't need to have stereo information in order to glue the drums together, or to get pumping in the pads. Then you can add some of the side channels for stereo effect but not so much that it upsets your dynamics.

[andrewsc]

nope

If you're ducking a pad and then sending drums in there too then the drums will be ducked and so the very kick that was supposed to take up the space created by the ducking would be quieted.

If you need to do all those things with the one compressor, it sounds more like you'd want to set the compressor up for each task separately and record them in separate takes.

A sensible order of operations may be this: glue the drums first since it may alter perception of the kick slightly. After that, if you need to compress the bass (without ducking), maybe do that, then lastly, figure out the ducking for the bass and pad which fit around the kick, each separately.

The mid side thing sounds an interesting skill to have, but a bit complex.

[fooddude]

Yeah..i've thought about mono...but, sometimes my pads/bass come from a stereo source (juno 60, esq1, etc.). I guess I can always just mono split the compressor when I don't have stereo bass or pads; or maybe just hook up the esq1 or my j60 as mono (but I would lose the lovely stereo'ism of them, e). As for percussion, I can aways use it as mono no prob, since almost all my percussions are samples coming from my mpc60 and s950 as mono. Another option would be just to get another compressor I guess, haha...but at the same time, I only have 4-sub-buss outs, and the other 2 are being used up as a stereo-filter (electrix filter factory)...maybe just get a bigger mixer with 6 or 8 sub-outs; but money is nil for me to upgrade anytime soon.

[mikeyoung]

using to much ducking on your percussion can take away the attack of the sounds.

[Musiclab]

I wouldn't do any of what you're doing, compress the bass, and if you eq the bass and the pad right, ducking is unnecessary.